On Trayvon Martin: a month later

during days after the jury reads
its words,
i am struggling for time to write my own,
and this boy —
he follows me

i think
every day about the black teenager and ticker
tape along the screen’s bottom and the
sick that piles up in my gut
and conversations with my oldest girl
about all that’s
broken

i think about laws that need fixed and
fear and violence and
hate
and how lost life can
become hot button or
confused clouded
silence
and how much
silence
speaks

i’ve said nothing here until now and i
don’t want that to read as indifference about the kind
of tragedy that is death by
a thousand cuts
and bullets to living lungs and
hearts

the morning after the verdict, i sit in church with
young boys,
children of color in
tight curls and tennis shoes that hint
at their someday size and they sit close
to their mamas and daddies,

and how they love their mamas like mine love me,
and how those mamas love theirs

the pastor says,God, we take hope in you because we have to
and prays,Lord, where there’s righteous indignation,
show us your next steps

and i do not know next steps,
but i will keep holding
space for all i do not know and
i will keep talking color with these white
girls of mine,
knowing it is the privilege and choice of
my skin to deny
color and voice and
story
because it is not my
own

i will wonder
about all that i don’t even see, all i can never know
because of this skin i’m in

so i will ask questions and listen,
and put my heart into the body of one who
sees eyes dart, purse clutched
and streets
crossed and proclaim that
i want new streets
for mistrusted, despised,
disregarded

and i will examine inside attitudes and
outside responses and never purport that i know what it means for
each one who walks
inside
brown or black flesh
in america

yes,
this teenaged boy in a hoodie — he follows me, and his life
will not let me
forget

_______________________

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Ashley this should be read at every class and meeting in our our church. It’s important that our church know that ongoing racism is not okay with some of us with white privilege and that we will speak out about it and stand with those who lose their lives and everything else because of racism. We want to continue to grow in our understanding even when we will never really know our brothers’ and sisters’ experience. Your profound words eloquently express where we are as a church. Would you be willing to ask Tory if you could put your post on our church Facebook page and/or website?

Dear Ashley
We have a saying in Afrikaans that silence is also an answer! Actually, I think we learn more from things not spoken than clever answers to tickle our ears! I sometimes wonder how much the pigmentation causing your skin color can affect your whole life so much. Such a humongous waste for our Pappa created us all equal; whether we want to acknowledge this truth or not. Great post, my friend, thanks.
Blessings XX
Mia

This is beautiful. I’m also a mama of 3 white-skinned girls. And I’ve been struggling with words too (blogging some but it just doesn’t seem like enough). I love my brown- and black-skinned friends, and I’m determined to keep working on understanding and reconciling and helping open others’ eyes. Thanks for this.

Thank you, Marla. These are complicated conversations, and they are a struggle, and we need to REMAIN determined. I appreciate you speaking and letting me hear your voice out there. May your courage and endurance be renewed as you walk the road far too infrequently traveled with your family and friends.

Thank you, Alia. I hear you about adding to the noise. (Maybe that’s why the distance and white space helped.) I look forward to reading/hearing thoughts when they come. You speak such wisdom and grace, friend.

I sit, trying to uncover the reason why these four words of yours keep ringing in me, like clarion bells or a chorus of voices starting soft, low and rising: “I want new streets.” I think it may be the sheer power of a heart behind these words that makes them beat with such loving ferocity. I want new streets…
(thank you and bless you, Ashley)

I am so glad you waited and approached this-as sometimes only a certain amount of distance will allow us to do-in a reasonable manner. We are all in this for the long run, and there are so many questions to which we need to find real answers. Thanks for your input, it goes quite a ways in finding real answers.

Thank you, Uncle Don. You are so right…we are in this for the long run. Sometimes I can feel the rush to respond or speak right away, forgetting that this is much more about endurance, slow listening and patience — not quick sound bites or one-liners. I appreciate your words here.

I’m so glad you wrote this… so glad, too, that it came after some of the initial online dust is beginning to settle, because people don’t tend to listen much then. This here is a thing of beauty in its reflection of your heart within your white skin, your admissions of what you don’t know, your refusal to be silent when so much within you is stirring and mourning and disturbed, your value and love for the lives of your neighbors – and indeed, how your ‘neighbors’ extend so much further than your physical location. Ashley, may we all long for new streets; may we all wonder at what we will never know inside our own skin. May we begin to walk in a bigger measure of humility and grace and longing for all that is wrong to be made right – especially when it doesn’t directly invade our own stories. Love you and your big, beautiful heart so much.

You are right, friend. In the wake, listening is hard to come by. I echo your prayer, Amber, and I love what you say: “May we begin to walk in a bigger measure of humility and grace and longing for all that is wrong to be made right — especially when it doesn’t directly invade our own stories.” Such a beautiful heart behind these words, and I see you living them out all the time. I love you, Amber.

I’m grateful for your words. I searched among my twitter family after the verdict and found few from the white Christian community and its all I wanted really…the dialogue… the exchange of ideas on race and America and the God we serve. Because it is real and painful. But we’ve got to do better at dealing with it. All life matters and it was a tragedy for – humans. I wanted to listen and be heard. So the silence was hard. Your words…even a month after are appreciated.Ashley. Found this posted on Kathi Denfields FB page.

Lisha, I’m so glad to see you and hear you here. It grieves me to read of the silence you found in the wake of the verdict, but it is not surprising. I am deeply sorry that you felt that vacuum of communication. Obviously, so many (white) people do not know how to have these conversations. In the past I’ve let my fear of saying something stupid keep me from engaging. Other times, I haven’t realized why continuing conversations were needed or fully realize the power of simply listening without attaching my own guilt responses. These are not excuses, but I believe they are true stumbling blocks. We’ve GOT to do better, as you said, Lisha, and I cannot tell you how grateful I am that I’ve met you here (through Kathi). I look forward to ongoing conversations. By the way, what is your Twitter handle?

This was wonderful! You’re making me think about all the current events and social injustices that sit deep in my heart that I could write about. And reminding me how privileged I am to belong to a church with many nationalities and colors represented. My kiddos aren’t quite to the age of talking about these things, but I love that they are seeing us embracing other colors with no holding back.

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